January 1945 The front comes up the valleyFront prichádza dolinou

The front reached Šariš in the autumn of 1944 and then stood still through the winter. When the Soviet advance resumed in January 1945 it moved fast: Prešov was taken on 19 January, Sabinov on 21 January, and the upper Torysa with Lipany in the same days. The road and the railway the armies used were the same ones the merchants had used for six hundred years — which is, in the end, the whole reason anybody ever fought over a small town in a narrow valley.Front dorazil do Šariša na jeseň 1944 a cez zimu sa nehýbal. Keď sa sovietsky postup v januári 1945 znova rozbehol, išlo to rýchlo: Prešov padol 19. januára, Sabinov 21. januára a horné povodie Torysy aj s Lipanmi v tých istých dňoch. Cesta a železnica, po ktorých armády prichádzali, boli tie isté, po ktorých šesťsto rokov chodili kupci — a to je napokon celý dôvod, prečo sa o malé mesto v úzkej doline vôbec kedy bojovalo.